Here In This Moment
by Fluffernutter8
Summary: "Matt is hiding something from her." Not quite spec fic for season 4. Oneshot.


Matt is hiding something from her. She's not too concerned, granted, because he's doing it badly, his tongue stumbling over his insistence that everything is fine, not smooth and wide-eyed the way it was when he was lying about his memory problems. But there's a low-key worry all the same, and maybe that's why she cuts a little short her lunch with Brett after their baby shopping.

The shopping, like so many things with this pregnancy, is slightly bittersweet. Because there had been a time when she thought she would be going to these stores with a round-bellied Shay, because she can picture Shay picking up some of the little outfits and giving that incredulous guffaw of hers. "Do they think we're having baby strippers?" she would ask, her voice a little too loud for politeness but just loud enough to make Gabby laugh.

Gabby feels guilty sometimes because the whole pregnancy is bittersweet to her, and for Shay it would only have been a celebration. But when the bells go off and she hauls herself into the ambo she can't help but think of her seat on Truck, the seat she had scrabbled for, the one she'd thought she had finally dug her nails into, the one that is now filled by a new candidate.

She knows that Matt can see the longing in her face, and they've spoken about it several times. There will be another chance for her, if that's what she wants, he tells her, because Matt has always tried his best to make what she wants into what he wants. But he can't quite lose the smile that's burst into his eyes from the moment she told him about the baby.

He'd been lying in the hospital bed after six days held by Nesbitt and the Russians. Antonio had just been in to tell them that the ME had ruled Katya's death a murder and that Nesbitt would go to trial for it. Matt was looking up at the ceiling, just a little gutted, because losing Katya, who he had spoken to and befriended and tried to help, was worse than pulling someone out of a fire only to have them die in the ambulance. But it hadn't been thoughts of relieving that pain that had led Dawson to lean over to him; she had just been sheltering this flickering secret inside of her for too long, letting it out only once, on the fifth day, as she leaned into Kelly's chest and told him, horror in her voice, that she was afraid that Matt was dead and she didn't know what to do.

So when she had the opportunity to tell him, she had taken a breath and rested her chin close to his cheek and said, "Matt. That night, I wasn't just coming over to see you. I had something to tell you." He had shifted his face so their eyes locked. "I took a pregnancy test and, I guess, that night, after Chicago Med…"

She was so glad that she could see his eyes, because for all her fear and doubt, for everything she would feel in the next months, she would never forget the wonder there at that moment. "We're having a baby?" he had asked, a rainbow in his voice, and for the first time since she had looked at the pregnancy test, she could imagine life with the baby. Not in detail, and not intentionally, but because she could picture one day telling her child how loved they were, because she could picture trying to describe to their baby how Matt's face had looked in that first moment.

He hasn't really lost that look in the months since. Even on calls, he buckles down during the action, but as soon as it's over he meets her gaze and she can see it in his glance and his smile as he turns from Casey back into Matt.

She can't see that glimmer as she approaches him quietly from behind, glad that the layout of their new house allows her to sneak up on him. He has headphones in so she can't hear what is going on, and she only gets a glimpse of the screen before he feels her breath on his neck and startles, snapping the laptop shut when he sees that it's her.

For the first time she feels bad, not for trying to discover his secret, but because of that panicked moment. His bruises have healed and she has taken to touching the longer-lasting scars- the rough slash by his hip, the three cigarette burns on his sternum- in bed at night because after what's happened they are marks of survival, tokens of his return to her. But he still has nightmares, the memory of being held for those six days sometimes peaking over him even though he had finally given in and started talking to someone about what happened.

"Sorry," she says quickly, putting up her hands and taking a small step back to give him some room.

"It's okay," Matt says, taking out the headphones and standing. He smiles at her, and she relaxes a little because it looks genuine. "I just didn't think you'd be back this early."

"I might have come back early on purpose." She goes to set her bags by the stairs so he can't see her sheepish face.

"Why? Is everything okay?"

She comes around the couch and touches his cheek. "Everything is fine. I just…" She looks away. "I wanted to see what the big secret is."

A look passes over Matt's face, amusement squinted with embarrassment. "You could have just asked."

"Like you would have told me."

He comes close to her face, placing his hands on her waist (or, she thinks ruefully, where her waist used to be). "I might have," he says, kissing her.

She breaks away after a minute. "So, can I see?" He groans and lets his head flop back, but he hands her the laptop. When she opens it, she can see a Rosetta Stone screen with vocabulary words about animals.

"I've been trying to teach myself Spanish. I wanted to surprise you," Matt says quietly. "Severide offered, but I don't think he learned anything that time he was going to move to Madrid beyond cursing and 'Where's the nearest bar?'."

"Is it so you won't feel like the odd one out at the next Dawson family party?" she says, joking because she half feels that she is going to cry. She looks away, putting the computer down on the coffee table.

"Yes," Matt says easily. "And because I know that your family's history is important to you, so I thought that maybe we could, I don't know, try to use a little at home. Or," he shrugs, trying for lightness, "We could do only English. Then I'll always have someone to talk to at the Dawson family parties."

"Or I could teach you both," she says softly. They are standing close together, and she wants to touch him, to anchor herself to this man, to this moment where she can't remember that there is anything marring the sweetness. She knows that the bad moments will come back, moments of jealousy and sadness and unfairness, but if she can have more moments like this, it will be worth it.

Matt seems to read her mind because he slides his arms around her again. "Oh, yeah?"

"Yeah." She clears her throat. "Yeah, I'll be a great teacher. We can start right now." She looks up at him, and as usual these days is a little overcome by the dazzled look in his eyes. "Te amo," she says, trying to keep her voice steady. "It means-"

She doesn't even see him move as he bends to kiss her. When he pulls away, he looks a little hypnotized. He rests a hand on her cheek and leans his forehead against hers and she is struck by the physicality of him, how good it feels to have him with her, amazing and breathing and alive. "I know that one," he says, and she doesn't think he's speaking only to her. "That one I'll always know."


End file.
